The Lifesaver Bottle Will Save Millions Of Lives: Sterile Drinking Water

Inventor and entrepreneur Michael Pritchard is the founder of LIFESAVER systems. They use unique patented technology, originally developed by Pritchard to produce safe sterile drinking water anywhere. The company is based in Colchester, UK and its products are sold in over 100 countries. The company’s goal is simple, to ‘End Water Poverty’.

LIFESAVER technology removes all microbiological contamination and has been proven in the harshest conditions from the flooding in Pakistan to the cholera outbreak in Haiti. Michael’s passion to end water poverty globally and provide safe drinking water for all resonates in his enthusiasm and dedication to the cause.

His company has been chosen by the UK Department for International Development (DFID) to be part of the UK’s Rapid Response Facility for short-notice deployment of LIFESAVER technology to any future international disaster. Using it’s latest ‘Infrastructure Replacement Technology’ the company has partnered with the government of Malaysia to provide remote villages nationwide with safe drinking water. By the end of 2013 this project alone will have lifted 1 million people out of water poverty, permanently!

Here's a good independent evaluation I picked up on the internet:

The LIFESAVER bottle is standard issue for all British military personnel in Afghanistan, is NATO recognized and is used by many other militaries around the world.

Michael has been a proud patron of the international aid exhibition Aidex for the last 3 years and has spoken and lectured at a number of international events including TED Global, MIT, iFest and PWC’s Diamond exchange. Michael has had numerous TV & Radio appearances including on BBC News, ITV, Italy’s IL SENSO della VITA, Fox News, ABC and many others.

Last year Michael consulted for BP’s Chief Technology Office on innovative solutions to prevent another ‘Deep Water Horizon’ catastrophe and has recently recorded a program for the BBC2’s flagship program ‘Horizon’ on nano-technology. Michael also accompanied Prime Minister David Cameron for a week on his Asian tour in 2012.

Michael is passionate about his work and is immensely proud that his technology is used by many international agencies including The Red Cross, Oxfam, MSF and Shelternow. His views on ending water poverty are now becoming better understood by the wider world. Michael’s TED video is used as an educational tool by hundreds of schools and colleges around the world. Educational establishments have started to teach these principles as part of the curriculum in Hong Kong (Longman Secondary Interactive Science (2nd edition)) and the UK (Optumus education - Inspiring Sustainability through Geography: Thought-provoking lessons for key stages 3 & 4). Here is that Ted Talk Video:

So there is one question everybody asks.... Can you use it to filter and drink urine? Their answer: You can filter urine with the LIFESAVER bottle or the LIFESAVER jerrycan and it will remove all microbiological contamination however as there is a certain amount of salt in urine the resulting water will have a level of salt dissolved into it that the LIFESAVER bottle will not remove. This will increase as the urine is repeatedly filtered.

We suggest that you could potentially do this up to four times before the salt levels become dangerous. However it is recommend that you seek alternate water sources before using the LIFESAVER bottle in this way.